The growth of home entertainment has introduced widespread use of tape cassettes.
These cassettes come in a wide ringe of standard sizes, there being smaller audio tape cassettes for use in recording and playing music by way of tape recorders, and larger VCR tape cassettes for video recordings. The range of sizes formates suitable for such modular storage is extended by the use of protective covers such as paper jackets, book-type cases, etc. Also suitable for such modular storage are BETA .TM. format video tapes, game video tapes such as NINTENDO .TM. and the slim jackets of computer discs, in a range of sizes.
The efficient organization of these various cases and cassettes has presented problems. Certain prior solutions have included, in the case of audio tapes, for instance, cassette boxes or carrying cases, wherein an enclosed box, having a cover therefor contains a number of cassettes in standing, compartmented relation therein. While suited for transportation, or the use in cars and other vehicles, etc., this type of storage is not particularly convenient for normal domestic use.
Storage of standard sized articles in individual receptacles or in racks is very well known, such as books in bookcases.
For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 2,102,083 MacDonald shows a receptacle for holding an individual cylindrical container, for ready, frontal access thereto.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,068,019 Schuster a plurality of separate trays are individually supported by the respective rearward edges thereof. This arrangement does not lend itself to close storage of articles, owing to the absence of any degree of lateral freedom, while requiring a free rear top edge of the tray by which to engage the respective clips.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,916,159 O'Neill shows the use of a series of mounting clips to provide shock and vibration mounting of electrical components such as transistors, wherein each component has an individual clip, including a resilient or spring-like top portion to clamp the respective electronic component in restrained relation therewith, and wing like lateral restraint elements to preclude lateral displacement.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,591,120 FIETZER et al. shows the use of a wire basket-like enclosure for the individual insertion and retention of a single box, in drop-in relation therein, for top access thereto.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,702,132 FITES et al. shows a portable cassette container having a ladder-like shelf arrangement wherein pairs of cassettes are displayed in face forward, laterally inserted slide-in relation at each level, being retained by way of a resilient, cassette gripping shelf portion in side-by-side outward facing orientation, wherein frontward removal is precluded by the proximity of the overlying, next adjacent shelf portion. This arrangement is of insufficient storage density to meet present needs, owing to the front orientation of the cassettes with associated required large lateral clearances for removing and replacing the cassettes, which impedes sufficiently rapid access thereto.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,257,524 Yonkers et al. shows a suspended rack unit having a series of adjacent cassette receptacles, divided by lateral partitions, and having spring loading means to secure a rear lower corner of a respective cassette in downward pressed engagement with an individual "heel" recess. This construction is a comparatively high cost, complex arrangement, apparently based upon injection molding of the rack unit body. In use, such units require the specific location of a cassette in precise, inserted relation between a pair of lateral partitions, and preclude mass removal and re-insertion by the handful.